Menus work, but TV image is just a black screen.

[ScottyDelicious]

I have a MSI Hermes 650 with s-video out and I installed a Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-500 with Windows XP and SageTV.

The installation of SageTV was totally smooth. I set it up with the s-video cable and audio connected to a standard definition NTSC TV and a SVGA monitor to the VGA port (it's hard to read the text on the TV).I got to the part were you select the channels, and I could hear the TV, I could see the video on the monitor, but on the TV it was just a black box, no display. I finished setting up SageTV and the menus, overlays, and all on-screen-display items look perfect, but there is no TV, only sound. I hooked the SVGA monitor back up, and the channels works fine that way. When SageTV is closed, XP displays just fine on the TV. As a test, I installed BeyondTV (yikes!!! no thanks) and MediaPortal (not bad, but still a work in progress). Both programs also had the same display issue as SageTV. great OSD's, but no TV image from the s-video out on the PC.

My question is, has anyone else had this problem, or heard of it, or know anyway to correct it?

thanks for your time. great product, wish I could get it to work on my TV!

-sD-

[ScottyDelicious]

DVD playback worked fine yesterday, now today, I get the same "Black Screen" problem I described above whe I try to play DVDs! what gives?

-sD-

[GKusnick]

Overlay video doesn't always work on a second monitor, even in cloned mode. Try using VMR9 instead.

[Opus4]

Did I miss what video card was built into that?

Overlay won't work in clone mode (unless it has a 'theater' mode, where _only_ the overlay is displayed on the TV), but can you extend the Windows desktop onto the secondary monitor (the TV)? That would be in Display Properties (right click on the desktop) -> Settings. Unless the video driver is poorly written, you can then drag the SageTV Window to the TV and use overlay on the secondary monitor after that.

If you want to use 3D Acceleration & VMR9 in SageTV, and you aren't using clone mode, you'll want to make the TV the primary monitor on that same Display Properties tab or else DirectX will be emulated & slower.

- Andy

[ScottyDelicious]

The TV is my primary display. when the monitor is plugged into the VGA port, the desktop is mirrored, so I can not drag a window to the TV part. When SageTV is running and I have both the TV and Monitor plugged in, I see the same thing on both, but on the SVGA monitor, I can see the onscreen guide plus whats on tv, on the TV I only see the on screen guide. for some reason the video for the television channel is not rendered on the TV screen.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by ScottyDelicious

The TV is my primary display.

I'm not sure if you are using the same terminology, but by "primary", I mean checking the Windows option for "Use this device as the primary monitor" in Display Properties -> Settings. You might mean the same thing, but the wording in the post doesn't look that way, because...

when the monitor is plugged into the VGA port, the desktop is mirrored, so I can not drag a window to the TV part. When SageTV is running and I have both the TV and Monitor plugged in, I see the same thing on both, but on the SVGA monitor, I can see the onscreen guide plus whats on tv, on the TV I only see the on screen guide. for some reason the video for the television channel is not rendered on the TV screen.

... it sounds like you have a single 'monitor' as far as the Windows desktop is concerned, and it is beling 'cloned' (mirrored) to both physical video display devices (your TV and SVGA monitor).

The video Overlay is almost always not copied when in any type of clone mode other than a special 'theater' mode... and even in theater mode, _only_ the video Overlay is displayed on the TV when it is active.

That is why GKusnick was suggesting that you use VMR9 if using clone/mirror mode, while I was suggesting extending the Windows desktop if you want to or need to use Overlay.

- Andy

[ScottyDelicious]

Thank you very much for your explanation. I am a mac guy. this is the first windows computer I have had in 9 years. I appologize for my lack of knowlegde with terminology, and also for assuming I did. sorry, and thank you for your patience.

Now... I really feel like an idiot for asking you guys so many questions, so I am going to be a good noob and use the forums search feature to find out about vmr9.

thanks again.

-sD-

[Opus4]

There's nothing wrong with being new to something & you usually won't get chewed out for asking a question around here.

- Andy

[ScottyDelicious]

Originally Posted by Opus4

There's nothing wrong with being new to something & you usually won't get chewed out for asking a question around here.

- Andy

I appreciate that.
Just to follow up, in case anyone else comes into a similar problem.
Everything works PERFECTLY when I have it hooked up to ONLY the television. I did not understand what happens when a display is cloned. Thanks to all who helped walk me through this. Great forum and great community you have here.

kind regards,

-sD-
scotty Delicious